Pops & Botches: AEW Dynamite – Homecoming – 08.04.2021

AEW Dynamite Pops & Botches

 

It’s HOMECOMING. You know what that means.

Dynamite made its return to the AEW Amphitheater at Daily’s Place for the most Regular Episode™ that’s a Special Episode™ of the show that we’ve had in several weeks. The result? A very, very regular episode!

It’s funny. I noticed Wrestle Talk gave this week’s Raw a 3/5 rating while also giving last night’s Dynamite the same 3/5 rating. Their lovable dancing talking head explained that WWE and AEW are measured on relative scales, so a 3/5 for one company doesn’t really apply to another. While I completely disagree with that line of thinking when it comes to unfairly cutting WWE slack, I do at least understand how a show like Dynamite can hurt itself by setting their baseline bar too high.

Last night’s show was good wrestling TV. It just wasn’t the WTF HOLY SHIT DID YOU SEE THAT kind of TV we’ve been getting from AEW for the past few outings. Almost like we’re in the calm before the storm or something.

BOTCH: Juvenpoop Carerra

Chris Jericho is my favorite wrestler of all time. Love the guy, even when his off-screen antics make it increasingly hard to do so. He performs at a very high level for a guy that’s 50+ and carrying 20 pounds of whiskey he doesn’t need. Last night was the first time I’ve seen him during his AEW run where I thought “Shit. Maybe it’s time to hang it up.”

Which brings me to my brilliant idea…

The Fifth Labour of Jericho, assuming he makes it past Wardlow next week, is the match with MJF, right? Well, it needs a stipulation, riiiight?

Make it a retirement match. Not “if you lose, your career is over.” Nah. That’s way too easy.

Have MJF insist that he be the one to retire Chris Jericho, win or lose. “You want a match with me? Only if it’s your last match.”

Thus concludes this week’s shower thought.  😛

POP-LITE: Penta Sez

The strongest argument for adding a third hour of AEW programming is to allow for stories like this to develop. We get cheated a little bit when they have to split this up into 3-minute segments spread across several weeks.

Every dude in this story needs to start punching each other in a ring as soon as possible, and I’m into basically any way this plays out. I just wish it would get along with the playing-out part, you know?

POP: Hangman The Lonesome Cowboy

The stuff with Adam Page and The Dark Order has been my favorite piece of AEW’s multi-platform storytelling since their inception. I wasn’t a religious viewer of BTW prior to ALL IN, but it has become a Monday afternoon staple for me, and a large part of what makes it must-watch content is Hangman & his goofy friends.

There’s nothing quite as wholesome as a bunch of beefy dudes who just want to do hard drugs, jack each other off, and support each other on their creative & professional endeavors.

Did you catch the CD/DVD that Hangman left on the table? Guess I gotta watch BTE to find out what it is.

POP: Trios Sweet

Gotta give another shoutout to the aforementioned Wrestle Talk review as they nailed the description of what this match is – AEW accidentally broadcast a really good house show match.

That’s not a slight on it at all. Just an observation. I think we all expected some more teasing of Darby Allin / CM Punk here, so it’s a bit of a let down that nothing transpired – outside of Excalibur paraphrasing Allin’s “best in the world” reference in a throwaway commentary line. Like I said before, though… Calm before the storm.  😉

One quick note about Mox, though: the double-underhook suplex version of the Paradigm Shift is dumb. It doesn’t look like a cool DDT when you do it that way. It doesn’t look like a cool brainbuster, either. It looks like a basic suplex. Like, even more basic than John Cena trying to use a fireman’s carry as a finisher. Just do a standard DDT and own it, man.

FTW: Taz and Friends

This is similar to the Andrade / Death Triangle stuff taking too long to get to the point, only I don’t want to see anybody in the FTW Family Drama story fight each other. I like everyone involved, but I can think of 20 people on the roster I’d rather see Ricky Starks mix it up with.

POP: Christian is gonna lose

There’s been a lot of chatter on Twitter and Reddit about how the Chicago fans at All Out will ‘hijack’ the show if Hangman Page isn’t in the main event against Kenny Omega for the AEW World Championship. The thesis is that AEW fans will reject an ex-WWE guy getting the title shot in place of the homegrown cowboy we’ve been rooting for all year long.

One of the feared non-Hangman contenders for that main event spot is the undefeated Christian Cage. After picking up the win in his match against Tres Comas Tequila owner butcher’s assistant, The Blade, they announced that Christian is now – in fact – the new #1 content for said AEW World Championship.

Cool. Am I worried that Christian is going to take that main event spot at All Out and lead to a riot at the former Sears Centre? Not at all.

Couple of things to go over here. First of all, AEW has stressed since the start that wins and losses matter. Each week, they give us a BCS-style ranking of the top 5 in each division. Overall record + quality of competition determines placement. Hangman effectively put his place on that list on the line when he challenged The Super Elite to an elimination match in hopes of securing a tag title shot for his Dark Order buddies.

Hangman could have simply gone to Gorilla and asked Tony Kahn when he’s getting his shot since he was #1 in the rankings. Instead, he went into business for himself and gambled his chance away. And… he lost. It didn’t matter how many Twitter or Reddit users really wanted to see Aaron Rodgers in the Super Bowl earlier this year –– he had his chance to get that shot, and he lost. Hangman lost the NFC Championship game, so he doesn’t get to play in the Super Bowl. Wins and losses matter. Sports-based product. Et cetera.

That leaves us with Christian. Does he deserve a title shot? Absolutely. Will it be the main event of All Out? My gut says no way. We’ll get that match on free TV and the main event of All Out will make sense and lead to zero riots. Remember, friends, this isn’t the company that actively hates their own audience. Trust that they have a plan. They haven’t let us down yet.

POP: Brittsburg Next Week

Damn. Somebody’s been hittin’ promo class hard.

Red Velvet brought the hot mic this week, and Britt Baker’s gonna bring the thunder next week. Get it? Thunder. Boom.

POP: Miro Forever

I love this guy so much, and I’m so happy that he’s not fucking around anymore.

Here, Miro is channeling the best selling Brock Lesnar ever did – making Lee Johnson’s offense look like a million bucks. I’m still not much of a Big Shotty fan, to be honest. He just moves so… slow? I can’t really put my finger on it. He just always looks like he’s about to fall asleep. Anyways, Miro kicked his ass, and any time Miro kicks an ass, we all win.

POP: Le Commentator

With as much as they’ve been featuring Jericho on commentary, I think my prediction about his upcoming retirement might be actually be correct.

He’s a natural fit for that role, and if he isn’t seriously considering making the move to the booth full-time, I hope he does.

POP: The Women’s Division… IS DOING THINGS?!

We had more than one women’s division storyline featured on this week’s show. Whoa.

To be fair, this one was mostly pertaining to a belt belonging to another promotion that will be defended on a non-AEW show… but I’m still gonna count it. Couple this very good wrestling match with the tease of Nyla / Statlander, and it’s almost like they’ve finally figured out that they’re allowed to feature more than one group of women at a time.

Keep it coming!

POP / BOTCH: Black and White

Malakai Black destroying Cody Rhodes in the now-annual “kill Cody so he can go shoot his game show” Dynamite tradition is great. Loved that part. Black looked like a killer, and his next feud is going to be a real get for whomever he’s paired with.

Cody, though? I’m not sure what the fuck they’re trying to do with him here. Teasing retirement? Ummmm… what? Did I miss something, or did this come out of nowhere? Seriously. Maybe I missed something. Does Cody also have his own 200+ episode run of a weekly Youtube show I need to watch to keep up? I’d believe you if you said yes.

What worries me here is that with Black interrupting Cody’s rambling attempt at a retirement speech, it certainly seems an awful lot like they’re setting up another match between these two. That’s a very WWE thing to do, and I don’t like it. I’ve never been into setting up a big PPV match by having a clean version of the same match on free TV. I’ll keep my fingers crossed, though, and hope that they’ve got a good plan for this, as well.

RIP: “Beautiful” Bobby Eaton

On a sad note, we close this week in remembrance of Bobby Eaton. He always had my favorite top rope leg drop.

Rest in peace, Mr. Eaton.

     

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